The province’s decision to order the City of Surrey to complete its transition to a municipal police force is “disappointing, misguided and based on inaccurate assumptions,” according to the city’s mayor.
Brenda Locke refused to take questions from the media regarding Public Safety Minister and Solicitor General Mike Farnworth’s announcement Wednesday, seen by many as the end to a long and bitter dispute over policing in the city. She instead released a prepared statement.
Farnworth said Wednesday that the province had given the city the option to choose between keeping the RCMP and completing the transition to the Surrey Police Service (SPS). But he said the city’s plan to keep the Mounties did not meet minimum conditions around staffing, and could threaten public safety elsewhere in the province by siphoning RCMP officers from other detachments.
Surrey council voted in a closed-door meeting in June to proceed with the RCMP option, but the city’s report on how it would meet the province’s conditions has never been made public.
In a statement, Locke said the choice the city was offered was “disingenuous.”
“It is very clear the City of Surrey never had a choice in this matter. We had a choice so long as we chose Minister Farnworth’s option,” Locke said.
The mayor criticized the eight-month process from when her council voted to scrap the SPS and Wednesday’s final decision — a delay she alleged had cost Surrey taxpayers $60 million.
The city has previously estimated maintaining two police forces at once is costing taxpayers about $8 million per month.
She also casted doubt on Farnworth’s legal authority to make the decision. Farnworth cited his duty under the Police Act to ensure public safety across the province, while Locke said the act also specifically gives municipalities the right to choose their policing model.
“In the coming days, I will be meeting with my Council colleagues and City Staff to explore our options,” Locke said.
“I will also be asking for a face-to-face meeting with the minister to understand how he intends to compensate the significant tax burden that will be placed on Surrey residents and businesses as a result of his decision to continue with the Surrey Police Service.”
The mayor said she wouldn’t comment further until she’d held those meetings.
Locke was elected mayor in the 2022 municipal election on a pledge to scrap the police transition, which was initiated under the administration of previous mayor Doug McCallum.
In 2018, she was elected to council as a part of McCallum’s Safe Surrey Coalition, which campaigned heavily on ditching the RCMP for a municipal force. Locke quit McCallum’s party in 2019 citing a lack of transparency and conflict over his approach to the police transition.
An independent financial analysis commissioned by the provincial government determined that keeping the SPS will cost Surrey taxpayers about $30 million more per year than the RCMP.
The province has recommitted to providing the city with $150 million to help offset costs associated with the new force.